Houston Merritt practiced neurology in an era when high technology consisted
of keen acumen, an inquisitive mind, and a prodigious memory. Equipped with
little more than a rubber reflex hammer, several tuning forks, and a safety
pin, Merritt succeeded in establishing diagnoses by eliciting detailed histories
complemented with focused neurologic examinations.

In addition to being a consummate clinician, Merritt, writes Lewis Rowland,
was “a singular leader whose career set models for clinical investigation . . .
clinical practice, teaching, editing books and journals, administering medical
schools and departments. . . . ” With Socratic pedagogy,
he trained a generation of prominent neurologists who, in turn, have developed
a worldwide lattice of neurology programs. We are fortunate that one of them,
Rowland, a protégé and successor chairman of the Neurological
Institute at Columbia University, has perpetuated Merritt’s
Neurology.